Meditations for a new year

Today I have been reflecting on the year behind us.

Honestly, I won't be sorry to see it go.

It really wasn't an enjoyable year and held more than a fair amount of changes.

I have struggled for years with depression, and with dealing with issues in my past, and this year broke me.

Truly.

For a period of time I just lost all trust and hope in God, in family, friends, and in the future.

So, at the end of this year, I feel like I have been wrestling with God for months. I am tired and ready to ring in a new year, hopefully one that is filled with laughter, peace, and hope.

Perhaps I will be able to attend church again this year. I long to go again but I am truly afraid of tearing my newly healed wounds open.
Time heals, and this may be proving true for me, but still I am waiting and fearful.

It just feels like it is too soon to try to get involved in a church family again.
Before we moved to Virginia we struggled to find a church and to fit into a church body; we had such a desire for family since we were so far from our immediate family.
We just couldn't find a place that felt like home and that was so frustrating. I realize that God was teaching us through that, and that we grew tremendously because of it. We didn't neglect the scriptures, or prayer, but many times we just felt like 'misfits'.

In the last few months the Lord has brought me back to His word and to 'my first love'.

Over the years I had read so many things that had confounded my thinking and influenced our homeschooling and our family life. God has indeed helped me to see that many, if not most, of those ideas were not His best.
Being in a culture that had standards of holiness based upon works creates very judgmental people.
The guilt I felt, on more than one occasion, because I knew that my life fell short of the high standards set by home school gurus, and people at our church, was overbearing. I felt there was no one to talk to or to share my struggles with.
Having home schooled for years, and in many states, the culture we left when we moved here was by far the most Pharisaic.
I have often said that no one would pay to go to a home school conference if the speakers stood up and said:

"If you are homeschooling your children do it because God has called you to, or because you have truly thought about education, and have a philosophical idea about what education is.
Do not do it because you think your children will be smarter, more holy, more polite, or the best at everything they do.
Do not do it if you think that by keeping your children from the influence of the world, not watching certain television shows, reading certain books, or wearing certain clothes your children will be holy little saints who do not, and have no desire to, sin.
If you home school you will still have to deal with sin in your household, especially the sin of pride. You will not be able to protect your children from the sin in their own hearts and, if you fellowship much in homeschooling groups and churches with lots of home school families, you will have to deal with the issue of 'white washed tombs', or little Pharisees.
Remember that the the Pharisees that Jesus condemned were once children who had studied the Torah and followed the laws and traditions set forth by the church to the extent that they had become leaders in the synagogue. But their hearts were unclean, they judged others, they made a show of worshiping God by wearing the 'right' clothes and saying the 'right' words, and most grievous of all they mocked and rejected the Messiah.
Remember, also that Jesus himself stated 'He who loves much is forgiven much but he who is forgiven little loves little.' (Luke 7:47)"

I realize that all home schooling families are not the same and many teach their children that their works are not attributed as righteousness. Our own family struggled with this issue many different times. We were led astray more than once by teachings that promised ideals here on this earth and we regret many of our decisions that were based on those teachings.

But this is not just a problem in the home school community. It is a problem in the Christian community. Church should be a place where people come to be loved, and to learn about Jesus, and to be accepted even in their deepest, darkest sins.

Sadly, many churches are not this way. As soon as a person reveals certain struggles they are marked and not counted as holy. It has always interested me that some struggles are acceptable to discuss and people have compassion for the offender, but others are unacceptable and treated as nonredeemable.

So, this is what my heart is meditating on today. As the new year comes I want to be cleansed of all the old teachings I received and accepted that have caused me to judge others as holy or acceptable or even striving to better themselves, (are you judging me? I am not proud of this).

And I long to attend church again but just don't feel I am ready.
Pray for me.